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National Justice For Animals Week

aldfcampaignThe Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALFD) created an annual campaign called the National Justice for Animals Week to raise awareness of how to stop animal abuse in your community.

ALDF is one of our favorite organizations.  They do good work across the U.S. by helping prosecute animal cruelty cases, pressuring for the enforcement of existing laws, strengthening animal cruelty laws, helping students interested in animal law, and through public education.

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Friday Fun: Chaucer The English Bulldog Meets His Puppy Daughter

Besides being sweet, this is some pretty cool video from a dog behavior point of view.  Great play bows—you can see photos and read about them. The lifted paw is another friendly gesture.  Want to learn more about canine body language?  Check out Canine Body Language: A Photographic Guide Interpreting the Native Language Of The Domestic Dog, by Brenda Aloff. It’s an outstanding and very useful book.

The only thing missing is oodles of praise for Chaucer for being such a gentle dog!


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Dogs, Humans, & Rhesus Monkeys Read Human Faces Same Way

happyfaceScientists have shown that dogs use the left gaze bias to look at human faces. Left gaze bias means the right side of an object is inspected first and for a longer period of time.

  • Adult humans show the bias only when looking at human faces that are right side up.
  • Infant humans show the left gaze bias when looking at objects, faces of any species, and faces in any orientation.
  • Rhesus monkeys show the bias towards upright faces of monkeys and humans.
  • Interestingly, dogs only show the left gaze bias when looking at human faces, whether the faces are upright or inverted.  Dogs don’t show the bias towards objects or dog faces.

This suggests that left gaze bias may be an adaptive trait that aided dogs in developing their successful relationship with humans.

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Friday Fun: Horatio Hamster’s Hike

horatiohamsterWe’re pretty fond of Horatio the Hamster. This ambitious little guy is on a virtual hike of the UK from Land’s End to John o’ Groats. His wonderfully geeky people have hooked up his hamster wheel to a thingy (actually a reed switch) that converts the revolutions of his wheel to distance on his route.  He averaged 4.07 miles per day last week!

You can track Horatio’s progress and read his travel diary. They’ve even analyzed and graphed his stats. Wonder what was going on on Jan. 17th?  You can participate in his hike if you live along his route or through a contest to guess the day Horatio reaches the end of his hike.

Update: Matt from Horatio the Hamster has offered to help anyone who wants help setting up their own hamster wheel like this.  Nice!

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DIY: Collapsible Travel Bowl From Oilcloth

oilclothbowl

Love this!  We have a couple of very utilitarian, collapsible bowls for summer outings with Saffron.  I’d much rather have the stylin’ oilcloth bowl in this great tutorial. It’s made following an origami pattern and then sewn in strategic places.

Depending on the patterns you use, these bowls could be really fun.  You could even do a faux bois bowl.

You’ll need:

  • oilcloth, two colors recommended
  • ruler & pencil
  • scissors
  • low-tack painter’s tape, like the Scotch blue tape
  • bone folder or a spoon
  • sewing machine
  • thread
  • sewing machine needle for heavy fabric like denim
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